


Mouth

by yeaka



Category: Die Verwandlung | The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka
Genre: Gen, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 05:22:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28701387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yeaka/pseuds/yeaka
Summary: The cleaning lady clamours on.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	Mouth

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don’t own Die Verwandlung or any of its contents, and I’m not making any money off this.

The floor’s a filthy thing, trampled as it is now not by six feet, but twelve, and the lodgers each more grime-ridden than the last. Grete, at least, doesn’t drag in much, and Mrs. Samsa doesn’t leave very often, but Mr. Samsa stomps in with dirt and dust and heaven knows what else—all of which it falls on one poor woman to clean. She does so without complaint, because it’s her duty, but she does complain or comment on many other things, even when no one’s around to listen. The thing in the stuffy room listens best, perhaps because all it can do is listen, and she likes it well enough for that, though she’d like it far better if it answered. She knows it could. Sometimes it perks up when Grete walks by, and the cleaning lady never misses that, because she’s a much sharper thing than any of the family give her credit for. 

She thinks of it while she scrubs the polished tile in the kitchen, because it would lift up its forelegs if they were in her way, and Mr. Samsa doesn’t. He stays in his chair like he was born there—like he simply sprouted up through the earth and was dropped upon his wooden seat, the newspaper brought in by fairies. He gives it a firm shake to crack it open, flattening out the wrinkles and stretching it wide. It swallows up his well-worn face and envelops him for several hours, maybe more after she leaves, because it’s one of the few days where he doesn’t have to run out for work. His sodden uniform is just barely visible around the edges of that massive paper, but she doesn’t ask to launder it, because he’ll only give her that squinted look as though _she’s_ the mad one.

In her humble opinion, the only thing of steady sanity in the entire place is the one thing that never talks. But, as her father used to say, it’s easy to seem sane when one never speaks, and thus never says a silly thing or proves wrong. 

She never listened much to that. Though she knows Mr. Samsa isn’t at all a fan of her ramblings and thus she normally endeavors to be quiet in his presence, on this particular morning, her curiosity gets the best of her. She muses aloud, “It’s a pity it doesn’t respond when I call or ask it things—animals usually like me, you know.”

A stern eye appears around the crisp edge of the paper. She keeps her scrubbing up and puts more back into it when her employer’s looking. She expects no more response from the father of the house than the creature of it, so she’s quite surprised when he mutters, “It isn’t any animal.”

As her mother used to say, everything’s an animal, Man most of all. But she catches the stiffness in his tone and reasons, “Well, it must have the mind of one—it can hardly be intelligent with the way you all go about it.”

There’s a stretch of silence broken only by the harsh grating of her sponge, then the splash of water when she twists it out into her bucket and gathers up more suds.

Mr. Samsa eventually asks, “What do you mean?” 

The cleaning lady clicks her tongue and explains the very simple point: “If it were intelligent, then surely I’d hear something of the conversations with it, since anything with any wit will also have conversations.”

“It doesn’t have teeth,” Mr. Samsa tightly tells her, as though he pried open its jaw himself to check.

“But one can still discuss. Why, you could simply ask a question, then instruct it to nod once for yes and twice for no, or to tap the ground or something of the like, and if it can see well enough, could even slide over a book and have it touch the words. People look after invalids all the time with less means of communication, and they manage when they like them. Now, I don’t go presuming that any one is overly fond of the thing, but—”

She cuts off when the paper rustles and pulls tautly into place. Over its razor-sharp edge, she can just barely see the flushed tips of Mr. Samsa’s ears. 

She knows well enough when she’s been silenced, even if it isn’t said so clearly— _she_ , at least, knows how to communicate. And Mr. Samsa no longer wishes to communicate. She can’t imagine why. The nonsense has gone on long enough, so she can’t be saying anything that they all haven’t thought of. At least, she imagines they must think of it a good deal more than her, given that they likely lay awake at night listening to its scurrying about, and they’re all so very pale from so rarely leaving it alone. 

But then, what does she know—she’s only a servant in a simple, mundane house no more or less indifferent to itself than any other. Tucking a lock of stray white hair behind her ear, she redoubles her efforts until her vivacious reflection is all over the floor.


End file.
